Evolving politics at the moment is tantamount to one step forward, and two steps back. The restoration of Punjab Chief Minister Chaudhry Pervez Elahi’s government by the Lahore High Court on the assurance that the legislature would not be dissolved until the litigation is pending has taken the steam out of PTI’s proactive agitational politics. The legal tangle in which the PTI-PMLQ landed, as the opposition filed a no-confidence motion and the Governor de-notified the chief executive, has now further pushed it in cold waters, and the strategic timeline that it was eyeing to call in elections, at least in two provinces, has ended up in doldrums.
It seems to be a great stride for the PDM and the 13 parties’ coalition in the federation as they have managed to prevail over the nail-biting situation and somehow managed the province of Punjab both constitutionally and by administrative means. The ruling dispensation in Punjab under Elahi and the PTI bandwagon are, nonetheless, clueless to the core and have a lot of introspection to do as to how and where they went overboard.
Though it seems a period of relative political calm will prevail unless the court decides over the issue, it seems the fragmentation will linger on. The PTI has to do some introspection, and come out of the obsession of taking the nation to poll on its timeline. Likewise, the federal government needs to take a break from retaliatory politics and stop putting all its efforts in cornering the PTI chief, and try to focus on more pressing issues such as the slumping economy and social degeneration.
The touch-and-go constitutional crisis in Punjab proves beyond doubt that the powerful Establishment is waiting in the wings. By deciding not to take sides, and let the law take its course, it has sent the message of wait-and-see loud and clear. We have been here. If that had not been so, the strategic pause by the PTI to solicit Establishment’s intervention would have been realised by now.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 25th, 2022.
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